I'm so excited to bring this conversation to you, my audience who may not be familiar with the innovative and groundbreaking work of adrienne maree brown. I don't think we even scratched the surface on the idea of a "social body" but I do think this conversation is full of nuance, warm hearted, radical thinking about how to be connected both internally within ourselves and externally to the world around us. We may not all agree on the right course of action for the events that are happening in the world, but we cannot deny that there are events that are happening in the world and all our humanity is entangled together, and there is no healing whether mindbody healing or global healing without transformative ideas and actions. I find just as mindbody concepts have given me a powerful framework within which to explore my human experience beyond the simplicity of pain = tissue damage, adrienne maree brown's writing, particularly the book Emergent Strategy offers a powerful framework for being in healing relationship with the world and how to create safety for ourselves and others. A little bit about the book Inspired by Octavia Butler's explorations of our human relationship to change, Emergent Strategy is radical self-help, society-help, and planet-help designed to shape the futures we want to live. Change is constant. The world is in a continual state of flux. It is a stream of ever-mutating, emergent patterns. Rather than steel ourselves against such change, this book invites us to feel, map, assess, and learn from the swirling patterns around us in order to better understand and influence them as they happen. This is a resolutely materialist “spirituality” based equally on science and science fiction, a visionary incantation to transform that which ultimately transforms us. adrienne maree brown grows healing ideas in public through her multi-genre writing, her music and her podcasts. Informed by 25 years of movement facilitation, somatics, Octavia E Butler scholarship and her work as a doula, adrienne has nurtured Emergent Strategy, Pleasure Activism, Radical Imagination and Transformative Justice as ideas and practices for transformation. She is the author/editor of several published texts, cogenerator of a tarot deck and a developing musical ritual. I hope you both enjoy this conversation and explore her work and the healing that lies within.
Quotes were selected from Good Reads - https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/1536532.Adrienne_Maree_Brown
You can find out more about adrienne maree brown's books, podcast and more here - https://adriennemareebrown.net/
Books can be ordered directly from AK Press here - https://www.akpress.org/catalogsearch/result/index/?p=2&q=adrienne+marlee+brown
If you want to get curious about what mindbody coaching is all about let's chat.
Book a free half hour curiosity call with me - https://calendly.com/paincoachdeb
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Website - https://www.thecuriositycure.coach/
[00:00:00] Hi, it's Deb from the Curiosity Cure, and I am excited, to share this interview with you. I had the privilege of interviewing adrienne maree brown, a writer and thinker that I am very inspired by.
[00:00:18] Reading about her on her website. adrienne maree brown grows healing ideas in public through her multi genre writing, her music and her podcasts. Informed by 25 years of movement facilitation, somatics, Octavia E. Butler scholarship, and her work as a doula. adrienne has nurtured Emergent Strategy, Pleasure Activism, Radical Imagination, and Transformative J ustice as ideas and practices for transformation.
[00:00:48] She is the author/editor of several published texts, code generator of a tarot deck and developing musical ritual. I am recovering from a cold. So if I sound a little stuffed up, it's because I am, but I also wanted to, I just didn't want to wait to be able to share this.
[00:01:11] I'm familiar with adrienne's work from Emergent Strategies, which is a fantastic book and also from, being adjacent to activists and movement leaders and in movement spaces and through the internet. I think one of the things that I have noticed over time is how my body feels when I read her words.
[00:01:40] Like there is a settling and a connection, a connection to like an imagined future that feels like things are more possible that even though we are sometimes in dire circumstances or we're in intense conflict, there's this kind of shift from feeling in that despair to also being able to kind of lift energetically into an imagined future.
[00:02:12] And I don't really talk about politics here, but one of the things that I reached out to her about was talking about the social body and how the social body, like who we are in our bodies, affects how we feel, it affects how people relate to us, what kinds of access we have around care, all kinds of things.
[00:02:33] And I'm going to get more into that as the podcast continues. I always talk about how we think about our bodies creates what's possible for them. So whether that's now for our individual body or social body or both of those things.
[00:02:51] So I think that what the bridge that I'm trying to make is that we can use these concepts in both of these places. That we can use her work and these ideas to help us create our individual imagined future because that is also how the brain works, right? And we can also do that in relationship to other people, to the planet, to communities, to ideas of liberation and justice and different people are, are located in different places around that work. Some people are deeply embedded in liberation practices, and some people are less so.
[00:03:41] What I notice in people who are dealing with mind body conditions is that we feel things deeply and that we care deeply. And oftentimes, that deep caring gets turned inward, the pain of deep caring because things are unjust. Things are painful. We witness pain. Now through the internet, we can witness all kinds of things for people that we will never ever meet. And those things affect us in our bodies, in our soma, in our psyches, in our sense of, safety. So I want to make sure that we're talking about that in a way that's generative. That's the kind of bridge that I hope that this interview brings for you.
[00:04:45] So I'm just going to read some quotes that I love, from her work, from different books. In pleasure activism, she says, "I believe that all organizing is science fiction, that we're shaping the future we long for and have not yet experienced."
[00:05:05] And I would also say the same thing for mind body healing, that we are imagining a future that we are not currently experiencing in our bodies and that kind of imagination sometimes it's really hard to believe when we are fixed on what is happening in and around us and to us and inside of us as the only possibility.
[00:05:33] We talk about visualizing, as a tool, but now we can even take it to this, other realm and link it to, science fiction, but fiction that then we make true in and of ourselves.
[00:05:49] " Your no makes the way for your yes. Boundaries create the container within your yes is authentic. Being able to say no Makes yes, a choice." And that is also from pleasure activism. I think in pleasure activism, there's going to be a lot of body stuff, a lot of things that really ring true for people.
[00:06:11] " I think it is a healing behavior to look at something so broken and see the possibility and wholeness in it." That is from emergent strategies.
[00:06:23] "I touch my own skin, and it tells me that before there was any harm, there was miracle." That's from Pleasure Activism.
[00:06:34] And that quote is a little bit like what we do when we lean into positive sensations, when we kind of turn our attention away from unpleasant or negative sensations, and when we're doing somatic tracking, we're just coming in, not only with this frame of curiosity, but maybe sometimes if it's really too hard to be with what feels hard or difficult with curiosity and a sense of safety, we lean into what feels good.
[00:07:06] And so maybe that is the touch of your hand on your skin, right? The feeling of your hand on your heart or your chest, petting a cat, like anything that feels good. What we're doing is teaching the brain that feeling good is possible. And these words are, are talking about our capacity to feel is a miracle that is inherent in our human experience and baked into our physiology. It is not just a nice thing to have. It is like this core brilliance of being alive and being human.
[00:07:52] Here's another one, which is "we are socialized to see what is wrong, missing, off, to tear down the ideas of others and uplift our own. To a certain degree, our entire future may depend on learning to listen, listen without assumptions or defenses."
[00:08:11] And that is also from emergent strategies. And, does that sound like somatic tracking? That does sound like somatic tracking to me. And so we're talking about how these techniques and ideas are the same, both for our relational experiences out in the world and our internal experiences within our own bodies.
[00:08:37] " Liberated relationships are one of the ways we actually create abundant justice. The understanding that there is enough attention, care, resource, and connection for all of us to access belonging, to be in our dignity and to be safe in community." And that is also from pleasure activism and, you know, for some people at some times all we have is the idea of that and building relationships can feel very scary depending on what's happened to us in the past. And so some of it is just holding this idea that we can create relationships. We can create access to belonging, holding our dignity and creating safety and community. Even if we don't yet know how to do that, holding the idea that it is possible can give us a framework from which we can step out into the world and create that for ourselves and create that with others.
[00:09:42] Here's some other quotes that I think are really useful for our own mind, body healing. And also, as we can see the effort that we put in the world and kind of how we drive ourselves. Sometimes there's a lot of perfectionism, all or nothing thinking, this feeling like what I give and do and who I am is never enough.
[00:10:04] I know for myself feeling really deflated or fearful or, feeling the intensity of these overwhelming insurmountable problems in the world really hits me hard in my own body. And so sometimes it's really useful to be reminded that we are one part of a whole. Here's another quote from emergent strategy.
[00:10:33] "What is easy is sustainable. Birds coast when they can." And I got this Feedback from Alan Gordon when I was doing my early mind body work, you know, he had reflected back to me that I was very high stakes. You know, I was trying to do this work perfectly, that it was working really, really hard with the tools and that kind of equation of equating working really, really hard with these are the only pathways to success and somehow discounting ease as a, as a part of the process. is really important. What, you know, even when we think about fighting for freedom or, you know, when people talk about somebody having an illness, like, or we're fighting cancer or we're fighting, um, there is something powerful and energizing about fighting. There's also something exhausting about fighting.
[00:11:35] And I want to bring in this idea that where can we create ease? Where can we let things feel good? Where can we feel that kind of sense of relaxation, the body softening as we are moving forward, not the only time we can rest is when we're exhausted. The only time we can rest is when we're so used up that there is nothing left, right?
[00:12:03] These kinds of positions in both the work that we create in the world and how we relate to our bodies, there's like a mirror happening. And so that's why I wanted to interview her because I think that her work is so generative as it is talking about change.
[00:12:27] We're in a scary time. I know that this conflict or war or aggression that's happening in Israel and Palestine is affecting me deeply. And I have watched myself move from feeling completely avoidant to being able to start to witness what's happening, start to try to find who am I listening to?
[00:12:57] Where am I getting my news from? Having deep conversations with people, starting to take actions that feel aligned with who I am and what I believe in. And so it's not for me to tell you what's important for you to do. But what I want you to see is that like the things that happen in the world are oftentimes also reflected in our physiology.
[00:13:24] So I want you to start to figure out how you take good care of you. Both in your individual body and then what it is that moves you to be a part of the social body of the larger self in the world. So I hope that some of these ideas are giving you a place to work with and are introducing you to her work and are inspiring you to connect, your individual mind and body, with the sense of yourself as a part of a larger whole.
[00:14:07] Let me see if there are some other quotes.
[00:14:08] Okay, here's a really beautiful one. "Pleasure is not one of the spoils of capitalism. It is what our bodies, our human systems are structured for. It is the aliveness and awakening, the gratitude and the humility, the joy and celebration of being miraculous." And that's from Pleasure Activism.
[00:14:34] Here's another one from pleasure activism. "I have seen over and over the connection between tuning in to what brings aliveness into our systems and being able to access personal, relational, and communal power. Conversely, I've seen how denying our full, complex selves denying our aliveness and our needs as living sensual beings increases the chance that we will be at odds with ourselves, our loved ones, our coworkers, and our neighbors on this planet."
[00:15:06] I invite you to listen to this podcast and let yourself metabolize these conversations. Take what feels salient for you and leave the rest or come back and revisit it at different times. And if you feel inspired, jump in to her work. She talks about it at the end, how to do that. I have a link in the show notes where you can buy her books. I hope you enjoy. Thank you.
[00:15:35] Deb: Your hair is super cute.
[00:15:37] adrienne maree brown: Thank you. This is, you know, it's, I have a great hairdresser because it's been weeks since I had it cut and it's growing out. Okay. To me, it's like very messy, but it's doing all right.
[00:15:50] Deb: I love it. You never know. You get that first cut and you walk out and you're like, I'm feeling fresh and it's amazing. And then like two weeks later, you're like, I'm wearing a hat.
[00:15:59] adrienne maree brown: Exactly.
[00:16:00] Deb: All the time.
[00:16:01] adrienne maree brown: Wearing a hat all the time.
[00:16:02] Deb: So. Well, hello. Yeah. So that's not what's happening for you. You actually.
[00:16:06] adrienne maree brown: No I'm like, my hair looks great.
[00:16:08] Deb: It does look great. So hello. It is super nice to meet you and talk to you. I'm a little fangirly at the moment.
[00:16:19] adrienne maree brown: They're good ideas. That's what I always tell people. I'm like, they're really good ideas. Like I'm moving really good ideas into the world. We should all be fans of them.
[00:16:27] Deb: I think so. I love how you said that. Right. Because I, I think I also sometimes receive like some like parasocial affection or compliments from people. And I'm always like, Oh, but you didn't, you're not like in my house and in my life seeing the mess. But I thank you.
[00:16:47] adrienne maree brown: Yeah, exactly. I'm just like, I'm a human moving these ideas. I'm like the reason I think the reason people get excited is that they're like, Oh, I want to move those ideas in the world.
[00:16:58] I want to live. Yeah, I want to live that way. I want to live in alignment with those kind of ideas. And I'm like, yeah, let's go.
[00:17:05] Deb: Right. You're like, it's not, I'm not the only one. I'm not the keeper of ideas. We give birth constantly. So I just, I wanted to say that, but I also, I was like, we're, we're starting, we've already started this conversation.
[00:17:18] Like I've already started this part of the podcast. Okay, if that's okay. Just cause for me, I think how in the work that I do and you may or may not know anything about me.
[00:17:32] adrienne maree brown: Well, I read, you know, I read the, like, when you invited me on, like, I read the descriptions and all that. Yeah. Well, yeah.
[00:17:38] Deb: I honestly don't remember. What I said and I went to go look for it because it was like a while ago and then I was like, I can't find it.
[00:17:48] adrienne maree brown: Social body. Yeah. It was like, you know, the body, the personal body, the social body. And I was like, I'm interested, you know, like I'm someone who thinks of my work as a somatic adjustment among other things.
[00:18:00] So, um, yeah, I was like, let's see what, what it is. Let's see what the conversation is.
[00:18:06] Deb: Amazing. Thank you. Yeah. So. In kind of how we connect and talk and how we, like, relate to each other, I think is also just, like, really important. And I come from a world when, in which, I'm still adjusting to, being a professional or being an expert or having a certain role. And so, and I don't like to Cut out all the messy parts.
[00:18:30] adrienne maree brown: Yeah. Being a human.
[00:18:32] Deb: Yeah. Being a human. Right. So, yeah, I, in my work, I help people recontextualize their somatic experiences differently, specifically around chronic pain. And it's, and one of the, it is great. It is great because.
[00:18:51] I think we have a very limited view of what chronic pain is, and when we kind of broaden out into the kind of, like, the actual view of it, which includes, you know, what's really supported in neuroscience, that the brain learns pain, and that is a response to Something in the world, like, you know, some kind of nociceptive, some kind of information, whether it's like information from within the body, but then we're a body within a larger body.
[00:19:21] And I don't see a lot of people in my world talking about the social body. And that's kind of what this next season of my podcast is about. Like I've been trying to help people start to learn the basics of pain neuroscience of sensory reprocessing, right? We need to have a language in order to imagine a different future.
[00:19:46] And I love the way that you talk about imagination in terms of social organizing. And so to me, there's like. I pulled up just a page of your quotes and I was like, there's so many things that I say to my clients or I share with people that like the meaning totally translates. And so I just was like, let's have this conversation.
[00:20:10] Also, I find a lot of relief in the memes that you share on Instagram and I was like, this is not by accident. I was like, there is some real beautiful intention behind it. So I just kind of want to jump in your brain. And build some bridges for my clients, because right now I have a podcast and I share things publicly that's for free, but then I also pretty much right now only work one on one with people.
[00:20:40] So it's like, I'm talking to one human being in one body, their world, but I think, you know, the real healing comes from when we can take that and expand that possibility of healing and understand that it's like, it's translatable
[00:21:00] adrienne maree brown: and do you approach it where your podcast is part of the prescription or part of the practice with your clients?
[00:21:07] Deb: Yeah, when somebody signs up to work with me one on one as a chronic pain client, I have a, like, four, I used to call it weeks, but a week, you know, I don't know why limit ourselves in time. So there's like four segments of learning. So I do this scaffolded learning about pain neuroscience so that we're not doing it in session.
[00:21:32] There's like things about chronic pain. There's things about the nervous system. It's just kind of how the mind and body are connected together. Concepts about pain so that we can start to think about what we're experiencing differently.
[00:21:47] Because it's really hard to experience things differently, if you don't know that you can.
[00:21:53] adrienne maree brown: That's right. Well, and I think there's something, you know, a lot of my book writing and podcasting and like just generally my work in the world is being like, Oh, like this is something I find myself saying over and over again.
[00:22:08] Why don't I create a resource of it, right? Why don't I create a place where people can come and kind of get it all at once? Yeah. That's my, you know, I, I come into this, I haven't been coming in this office as much like summertime. And so I've been out on my back porch doing more work and my plants are like parched.
[00:22:27] They're like, help me, please mom,
[00:22:31] like, sorry, guys, I'm sorry, I'm going to start taking you with me next summer. I'll take you. Hmm. That's sweet.
[00:22:39] Yeah. Yeah.
[00:22:40] Deb: So say, and I have people and I'm sure that you do with your podcast where people like show up and they're like, that really helped me. Yes. Right. And so the same thing, like when I had started my podcast and I like didn't tell anybody I had one and then people would be like, wow, I listened to your podcast and it really helped me. Like I would just have the shocked look on my face because I was like, Oh, that thing that I didn't tell anybody about. And then I was hiding.
[00:23:05] So for me, my process has definitely been very emergent, like showing up to do the work, even though I didn't feel confident. So, all right, but this is not this podcast. It's not actually about me. Um, people can listen to my other podcast episodes
[00:23:24] adrienne maree brown: both for you and for others.
[00:23:26] Deb: Totally. Let's just start with who you are, where you are, maybe if you want to share, you know, but
[00:23:33] whatever that is, amazing
[00:23:36] adrienne maree brown: and I, it's a reverse migration process really for me, my parents are both from the Carolinas and I've grown up living all around the world. I never imagined I would be living back in the South. Actually, again, it has become a really compelling to me, um, as a space to write from and a space to, yeah, just sink into the earth and be outside a bit more in the year and be closer to my roots.
[00:24:07] So that's where I'm located. Yeah.
[00:24:10] Deb: Amazing. And you have a porch that you get to enjoy.
[00:24:15] adrienne maree brown: That's part of the Southern charm. Um, almost everyone I know who lives in the South has a porch on the front or the back and spending time on the porch. I'm actually screening my porch in, right. So I had a patio that I'm turning into a screened in porch. Um, cause I was like, bugs are the only thing that's keeping me from being out there even more. And. They don't have to be up in here with me.
[00:24:41] Deb: Totally. Oh, that sounds amazing. And um, what else do you want to share about kind of like who you are, the work that you're doing now or the work that you've done in the past?
[00:24:54] Some people, some people in my audience will be familiar with you and some people, this will be their brand new introduction.
[00:25:00] adrienne maree brown: Yeah. So my name is adrienne maree brown. I am a writer primarily. That's how I, um, Like when I think of like everyone plugs into the world in a different way, the way I plug in is by writing things and I've written a number of books.
[00:25:18] Um, I think of myself as a gardener of healing ideas, and I'm trying to always grow these healing ideas in the public. So some of the ideas that I have gotten the honor of growing are. Emergent Strategy, which is about how we get in right relationship with the fact that change is constant. And so we need to be adaptive and relational and interdependent and creating more possibilities for how we move. Um, Pleasure Activism, which is how do each of us reclaim our internal wired right to have pleasure in our lives and how do we make justice and liberation some of the most pleasurable activities that we can engage in, um, also transformative justice, radical permission, collective ideation and imagination. Um, I yeah, I love really big audacious concepts that are rooted in mundane practice.
[00:26:18] So then, Oh, this is massive idea. But then the way you practice it is, you know, well, I'll speak to like in this week, so we're having this conversation as this whole situation is unfolding in Gaza and so it's like these massive concepts of what I believe my practice has been, let me go visit one of my Palestinian beloveds and be with them in their grief. Let me have conversations with Jewish leaders and Arab leaders about what's happening. And like, let me connect more and more people to the resources I know of to help figure out how we navigate this. So it's small activities, very relational. That are tied into a larger belief that the changes that we're going through in this moment are inevitable changes based on past behavior and they're portals to something else that we can shape together through holding on to each other.
[00:27:16] Most loving action, or what is the most loving choice here?
[00:27:19] Oh, my God. I love that. There's a concept that I transmute sometimes. And I did on a call, which is like, what is the most loving action, right? Or like, what is the most loving thing you can believe, even if we're not articulating it, you know, and just trying to change that lens. Because I think people are often so in a self protective way, because we've been hurt, right? Because there have been hurts like these hurts are real,
[00:27:52] real traumas, real hurts, real pain. And, and I think that they, it's like the traumas are real. And then the socialization about how we understand our trauma is also real.
[00:28:04] So it's like who, you know, almost all of us are socialized in some way to think that our pain is a more valuable, real, and intensive pain than anyone else's pain. Right. And especially for those of us who live inside of empire, who live inside of superpowers, who live inside of places that have a lot of privilege and power.
[00:28:28] We think of ourselves as untouchable in a way we think of ourselves that, you know, it's like we're impenetrable, but it actually makes us quite vulnerable. You know, like, it's so interesting to see how quickly we can take things personally or how quickly we can get offended or how quickly, you know, when I'm like, Oh, if I have to deal with what the rest of the world, what most of the global South is dealing with on a daily basis, I have to deal with that level of dehumanization um, I couldn't go into that with this level of hyper trigger vulnerability. I'd need to be shored up more in order to even move through that level of crisis. And then within the U S I find this happening all the time that there's people who mostly don't have to experience a lot of pain, like physical pain, economic pain, um, the pain of racism, the pain of transphobia, those kinds of pains.
[00:29:25] Folks who don't experience those tend to be the most hypersensitive about how they're spoken to and what they expect. So it's really, you know, which is always, you know, one of the early politicization things for me was like, turn towards those who are at the center of impact. Turn towards those who are on the front line of impact and listen there and learn from that place and it never steers me wrong. You know, because it is, I'm like, it's pain.
[00:29:55] Deb: It is pain,
[00:29:56] adrienne maree brown: pain, pain. Most of our structures of modern humanity are built in reaction to pain, trying to protect from pain, trying to legislate and, and build a wall so, you know, so that pain cannot touch us and it always does.
[00:30:13] Deb: Yeah. There's this, uh, inextricable experience of being human that requires us to build a relationship with pain. And one of the things that I do with my clients is we work on what are their pain behaviors and pain behaviors are often avoidance behaviors. So we start to think, okay, my back is hurting. I can't sit in this chair and I can't do this thing.
[00:30:38] And the way that we put pain, like physical pain at the center of our experience, um, makes it bigger. In a lot of ways. And so, you know, and try to root it in, like, how the brain learns and what it, you know, like how we take perception. But I, I also think that same thing when we have our own personal pain is in the center of our, Our daily life and our lived experience.
[00:31:08] There's not a lot of room for other people and other kinds of like relating. It's it's complex.
[00:31:18] adrienne maree brown: Yeah, it is. And I, I do think that there's a. It's so interesting because I think we can tell it in our own bodies, even if we can't make the adjustment. So in my own body, if I'm like, uh, and I've been going through this, I've been going through a major shift in my relationship to disordered eating.
[00:31:37] One of the things I'll notice is I'm like, oh, if I eat this. It's going to cause massive inflammation throughout my body. It's going to put me into more pain. And so I shouldn't double down on it. I shouldn't have more and more and more of that. That's just going to create more and more pain. But we don't seem to make that adjustment at a societal level, right?
[00:31:58] We're like, oh, that hurt. I'm going to double down. I'm going to go harder. I'm going to create more pain, more pain, more pain. And it astounds me. But then. You know, there's a way that pain can feel like, at least I can, I, I, this is an undeniable reality that gets, this is true. I am in pain. I'm hurting right now.
[00:32:20] It can become an identity for people where it's like, pain is the primary operating, um, not principle, but it's the primary operating like system for life. Yeah, trying to avoid it becomes, you know, It can guide every aspect of your life. Like you can live a whole life that is guided by pain. I've been trying to get into relationship with it as communication.
[00:32:47] I think of pain as a way that my body is communicating something to me. Yeah. Um, And that something could be move your arm or that something could be, there's something you need to heal that happened when you were a kid, or there's something that happened to your ancestors that's like shaped your spine, and
[00:33:08] there's some, yeah, I love that.
[00:33:11] Deb: I that's kind of where I'm always at with clients because I'm like, sometimes we don't know what's being said and we kind of jump to conclusions and it's like when we open the frame to be like, what is it that my body wants me to know right now? And sometimes it's like, Oh, I don't want to feel this exquisite pain of witnessing this world event that is so beyond my conceptualization and I feel so helpless that like it's almost unbearable.
[00:33:41] adrienne maree brown: Yeah. Yeah. It is. Well, and I think it is.
[00:33:43] Deb: I think it maybe should be unbearable.
[00:33:46] adrienne maree brown: Like it's unbearable, right? But I'm like, I think we don't do the right thing with the unbearable, right? For me. And I think the way my empathy is structured, when I see that something is unbearable, I'm like, how do I, is, do I have a relationship to that thing where I can actually stop that suffering?
[00:34:04] Because if I don't, Then I'm like, okay, I'll light a candle. I'll say a prayer. I will trust it to the universe, right? There's, there's not something that I can do about that. But if I do have something right. So, like, in this, in this moment, where I'm like, the thing that I can impact is I'm a U. S. taxpayer and the U. S. tax dollars are moving at the level of billions to support the Israeli government in whatever they're choosing to do right now. And so I'm like, I don't think that the choice you're making is going to get you the results you want. Like the result is safe safety in Israel, right? If the result is safety for Jewish people, if the result is safety for, um, For folks who have been displaced and displaced and harmed and displaced and traumatized and it's like an idea of safety there.
[00:35:00] I'm like, I don't think attempting to eradicate or genocide and other people will ever get you the result of that safety. I think it actually, it's a, it's an enemy generator. Right because it's like, you're compounding now trauma for more people who are going to be like, I know who I blame for what just happened to me.
[00:35:19] And I know who I blame for what has been happening to me for the past 75 years and what has been happening to my family and I. This, but you being able to step outside of history, just enough to see it and be like, Oh, look at how this trauma cycle led to this trauma cycle. And I'm always asking people to step out enough to say who benefits from this trauma cycle, because I think there's a lot of people on the ground in that area who are being used as pawns to actually protect the interest of the United States in that area, in that region.
[00:35:51] Yeah. That's deep to me, right? It's just like, Oh, who actually cares about the lives of the people on the ground? Right? Like, it's been so deep to just watch the situation play out and be like, y'all, there's, there's, even if you're only care about hostages, even if you only care about the Israeli hostages, I'm like, they are in the area that's being bombed.
[00:36:13] Maybe don't bomb there. Like, it's not, that's not how you're going to get anybody home safe. What is the, what is the reasoning? Right. But. Right. You know, I'm not a world leader. So then I'm like, Oh, what can I do? I can ask people to call their Congress person, I can ask people to mobilize into actions. I can ask my family to do those things.
[00:36:34] I can ask my friends and what you were just talking about, a lot of it is the relationship is what people where I'm, where I've, I've got folks who are like, I'm not, I don't want to turn and look. I can't handle it. It makes me think of my own babies. It makes me think of my own trauma and I'm like, beautiful.
[00:36:53] So what would you want someone to do on behalf of you and your babies? You want someone to do on behalf of you and your family in the same situation, you can just insert yourself into the situation enough. Oh, I don't have to look at all images. I can make a phone call and say, I don't want us inflaming this any further.
[00:37:16] Deb: So when you I kind of want to lead it back to like you and your body, because I feel like yourself as a facilitator, I'm only because you're very skilled at this, right? You've created this, this kind of world. You have created this imagined world in which you have all of these relationships. That are so powerful that you can lean into and like have those connections.
[00:37:44] And I feel like so many people feel alone or disconnected or just are fighting with people on the internet, which I'm always like, is that supporting your sense of safety? Like if we think our safety is intertwined. Right. And also just like, there's a, there's a whole kind of construct and narrative in pain reprocessing, which is about teaching your brain that you're safe.
[00:38:10] Right. Which directly conflicts with a lot of things that are actually happening in people's lives, whether individually or collectively. So it's a very weird paradox to be creating and helping people develop this feeling of safety, even within a larger sense of unsafe so that their Soma, so that their body can be releasing that fight or flight constantly, and that kind of brain habituation of that's keeping this kind of physical pain and emotional pain kind of front and center. And so there was something that you had said about being a facilitator, and kind of coming to your work as a facilitator. And my question was like wondering what that creates for you because you described it as learning how to make it easier for people to be with each other.
[00:39:10] Yes. And, um, I think about like some of the work, like some of therapeutic practices like IFS. It's kind of like teaching ourselves how to be with ourselves, like all the peoples of the internal within us, internal family systems. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, so I was just thinking like, how does that help you? Like if you are a singular organism inside a larger structure, like what does, what do your relationships help you feel?
[00:39:43] adrienne maree brown: Let's see. I mean, I think part of me wants to go back a little bit to what I've learned about this, which was when the pandemic first started, I was in the middle of a sabbatical and I went to, I was in Italy and it was like, everything's going down in Italy. You have to get out of there. You might get stuck there. So I left, I didn't want to go home yet.
[00:40:08] I was like, I'm supposed to be traveling around the world and healing, you know, it's like, What can I do? So I went to Hawaii and I got this little apartment that was looking right out over the ocean and I was like, this is it. This is my happy place. And it was so gorgeous. But within like a week, the beach was shut down.
[00:40:27] The pool was shut down. Like, you couldn't really be around people and I didn't have close relationships on the island. And so I found happening was, I ended up going for like three months without human contact, human touch, hugs, someone to rub my feet, you know, that wasn't paid to do so. Right. And like, um, I had a sweetheart at the time and we weren't in touch, but, you know, you just start to realize like, Oh, there's a different level of contact that a body needs in order to, um, exist, and my body needed that.
[00:41:06] And so I had never had that before. I'd always been the other way. Like I was like, I need more time alone. I need more time by myself. Yes. Only I could just be by myself. I just, and then after that, I was like, I need people. I need a good balance of people. Like I, I like living on my own. I, you know, I have a lot of friends and lovers and family and other folks now.
[00:41:30] And I. I invite people to come spend the night. I invite people to come visit for a week. I invite people to come be around me because I realized that my body needed to be in relationship with other people that I felt safe around, I started to really tune in to what are the things that make me feel safe and two things occurred to me.
[00:41:52] One is external right is, as people are coming in, my body, my mind, my Soma, my history are all making assessments about the safety of this person. And I was socialized pretty early on. Like, I think a lot of people were to override all that data and all the flag stuff that's coming in for the sake of connection for the sake of not being alone.
[00:42:18] Yeah. And if this person wasn't safe. Even if they didn't. Um, actually care about my dignity or protecting my wellbeing, let them close because then I wasn't alone. Right. One of the things I feel like I've learned a lot is about that discernment process of like, Oh, that's emotional unavailability. That's emotional unaccountability. That person is literally not clean enough to be around me or whatever it is.
[00:42:43] Right. Like there's these are, you know, and I mean that in a very technical sense, right. That I'm like, Not technical spiritual sense, right? I'm like, they're not doing the spiritual hygiene that they would need to be able to come. Right? So that level, the external, and then there was this internal piece, which is.
[00:43:07] I was socialized to contort so much to generate safety between myself and someone who maybe actually wasn't safe. And I've let that go to a large extent, sort of people pleaser contorting fawning appeasing. I will shaping. I mean, I'm sure it's still in here because it, I'm 45 and like 44 years of it we're trained into doing that. Right. But, but I do feel that I can feel that loosening in me that I'm like, I'm not supposed to adjust away from who I am for the sake of someone else. That's not what creates safety. That creates, um, a danger in me. Right. Duality or a, uh, a lack of integrity in me that drives me into harmful behavior.
[00:43:52] So part of what I've been really practicing is like, how do I stay true to myself and let that truth all the way to the outside? And then how does, how do I really assess what's coming at me? So that connection that I'm making is one that is rooted in my integrity of relationship with myself and my investment of what's actually true inside of that other person.
[00:44:14] Deb: I'm exhausted just hearing that just kidding, because I think it is, it is work. Absolutely. And I mean that in the, in the, you know, I tend to joke around a lot. Um, so also please tell me if like something that I think is funny isn't landing, um, um, because I want to, like, I say it in a way to honor the work, cause that is the work, but also the whole point of it is joy. The whole point of it is coming into yourself and being in that kind of coherent self where you really are in this foundation of self-trust and that beautiful place of getting to choose. And sometimes
[00:45:03] adrienne maree brown: even, I know everyone wants to do that. You know, I, I heard an interview the other day, uh, where Jada Pinkett Smith, you know, she's doing this book tour right now and, and or she's got a book coming out.
[00:45:13] Mm-Hmm. . You know, memes, everyone's doing means everyone's talking about whatever, but she's like, you know, I want to share with people what it has actually taken for me to feel healing happen in my life. Like, that's what she's actually, and she's like, it's not for everyone. It's not for everyone. But if you are interested in that and it felt like such a Virgo thing to say, cause I'm like, that's, that's the Virgo way.
[00:45:37] It's like, I'm really interested in the labor, the due diligence, the integrity, the work it takes to heal your life, you know, I'm really interested in that. I want to keep becoming all the way until the last breath. I want to keep learning as much as I can and healing as much as I can. I also feel like I'm healing for generations behind me.
[00:45:59] So I'm like, I'm really moving a lot in his lifetime and I need about it. You know, it's not for everyone. But for me that there's a deep joy that comes from being in alignment with myself.
[00:46:11] Deb: Yeah. And for me, like the framework that I often teach through is like through neuro and bioplasticity. Like I, my work is, is rooted in like science y language because I think, I don't know, for me, it's fun. I'm not, A very spiritual person. Um, even though I feel spirit really deeply, so that's right. It's like all the relationship to like religion. What,
[00:46:39] adrienne maree brown: what is the distinction for you between feeling spirit deeply and being a spiritual person? Um,
[00:46:45] Deb: I think I just have a lot of like, uh, unprocessed, like things about growing up jewish in a conservative community in Long Island that was very aligned and organized by what I think of as whiteness because, uh, we didn't want to be threatening to the larger white community. And so some of it is like, yeah, religious, cultural trauma, totally. And, um. So I think sometimes when I think about religion, I just feel my whole body like want to like deflate, right?
[00:47:22] Like there's this sense of like, ah, that's not really what I want. It's like somebody gave you a dessert and you like really want a dessert, but they gave you this thing thing and then you didn't really want it. And you're like, Hmm, no, I'm either like supposed to eat it or I have to say no. Or like, so I think of like spirit and connection, like That is the dessert.
[00:47:44] That's the thing that I'm really enjoying. And so sometimes it's outside of religion and it's outside of,
[00:47:51] adrienne maree brown: and that's what I would say. Spiritual person, but you're not religious person. And yeah, totally. Here it is just that energy that is flowing through the world. Yeah. The aliveness that flows through.
[00:48:05] Yeah. So much of, yeah. I do think it's part of our decolonization and our healing work is to be like, you know, I think that most religions at their beginning we're rooted in that spiritual connective tissue. And I think best spiritual connective tissue. But I also think that when groups of humans come together, you know, Octavia Butler said, our fundamental flaw, our, our fundamental flaw as humans is that we always use our intelligence to enact hierarchy over each other.
[00:48:38] When we get together. We're like, who's, who's the boss? Who's in charge, who has the most power. Yeah. I think that that happens. In organized, anything organized, organized governments, organized everything, you know, we're like thinking about power and I don't think as human beings, for the most part, I don't think we've learned how to hold power with integrity and to hold it together.
[00:49:01] Right. I think the way that that shows up in your body is like, I don't, I don't want to even deal with that. I just, yeah.
[00:49:11] Deb: And there's a lot, like I can see all of those moments throughout my timeline and even understanding stories of, of my larger family, you know, my ancestors, like I can see and feel that feeling of defeat, that wanting to curl in myself and like, and really now just kind of loving that part of me, like that, that response is part of my, it's just part of my process. It's just part of like, whatever it is that I'm here to figure out. And when I think about it, you know, then I go like hop up in my brain and love to like. Okay, let me come up with a concept or a story or a metaphor or a way, right?
[00:49:56] We have to, we do, or most of us use language to convey things. And you probably know that because you're a writer. Uh, so then I kind of like come up into my brain and be like, okay, and right now like, uh, neuroscience is my most fun place to imagine things. And so when I think about neuro and bioplasticity, I do think about how bodies change. We used to think that the brain was a fixed thing that you grew up and that adults brains don't change unless something like happens to it, right? Unless there's like damage, but that's not true at all. The truth is that change is an innate part of the human experience.
[00:50:39] And so if we can orient ourselves towards the change that we want to be experiencing, both kind of inward in our own encasement of self or in community, whatever it is that we're trying to do, it's like really just believing that like change is actually easier, maybe more fun, more delicious. Like when we cultivate it and create it and seek it out, we'll see it everywhere.
[00:51:11] When you think it's not possible, then it can pass you by all the time and you can't notice it.
[00:51:18] adrienne maree brown: That's right. That's right. Yeah.
[00:51:23] Deb: So I was just when you were saying like his what's changing inside of you is change, is changing. So anything then that goes forward is different.
[00:51:33] adrienne maree brown: That's right.
[00:51:36] Deb: I'm spacing out. My brain was like, I'm going to have 10, 000 thoughts. They're all going to happen at the same time. And then I will have nothing. It was so beautiful. I love my brain. I love, you know, it's been a hard road to like, love my ADHD, used to be perimenopause now menopause brain, like, and there's just like, I know that I've changed because I can have this kind of moment and be just in delight that my brain just has this moment where it's like, I have no thought.
[00:52:10] adrienne maree brown: You know, this is one of my mentor, Grace Lee Boggs at the end of her life.
[00:52:15] She was like, it's, it was really chill for her, you know, and I would be like, what's on your mind? She's like, nothing, you know, it's like, it was peaceful. Like I'm having a moment of peace as opposed to a moment of like lostness or searching or something else. But
[00:52:30] Deb: and that's, that's that orientation towards what is
[00:52:35] adrienne maree brown: being at peace with what is.
[00:52:37] Deb: Yeah. My dad is 97 and he is not at peace with what is going on in his mind and his experience of it is one of great suffering. It's hard to witness and I can't remedy it. That's the hard part. It's like, you know, my orientation is as a healer and a helper and a fixer and a whatever and uh, to just realize like, oh, I can't actually. Um change his internal experience.
[00:53:10] adrienne maree brown: Yeah. You know, I, I think about that with, there's certain, you know, Alzheimer's dementia, these things that happen as we get older and I've read stuff that's just sort of like, yeah, we've extended human life beyond what our bodies necessarily want to do or can do. But we think.
[00:53:30] And I think about the, I, I really, it just befuddles me. Like, I'm like, I'm trying to, I'm with everything that happens on earth. I'm like, what's the purpose of this? What's the purpose of that? What's the karmic purpose to it? Is there a social purpose to it? Right. Why is, why is. You know, and I think about it with everything, you know, I'm like, why is war happening?
[00:53:57] Why does cancer happen? Why does, you know, some things I'm like, oh, I can see the reason for mosquitoes never, but I'm like, I don't understand it all. And that humility helps me a lot. Cause I'm just like, there's parts of this that are beyond my comprehension. Um, and that might be the most spiritual thing I'm aware of is, yeah.
[00:54:21] Deb: Can you say more about that about, cause I see a lot of suffering in people when they either. Um, hold on to a belief, um, so strongly that they're like anything that comes to kind of threaten it, uh, kind of creates a attack and like this strong defense mechanism. And I totally get it, but also I feel like I don't know, there's this like mistaken power of being right.
[00:54:52] adrienne maree brown: Yeah, I mean, I think that it gets us in a ton of trouble and I'm always, I'm always trying to challenge us within myself and I'm learning to be, to root more in my body than in my mind when it comes to where I'm looking to for my rightness or my, my alignment, but I think there's, I think we don't necessarily understand that the worldviews that we're given are, yeah.
[00:55:22] They're given to us for a reason, like they're given to us to make us participate in society as it is. And then I think there's a certain moment that comes along where it's like, but society as it is, it's not actually a just place or a fair place, or it's not really looking out for everyone, or it's actually kind of some great injustices.
[00:55:42] Right. And I remember that politicization process of being like, Oh, Like, I have believed some things that were not right and each time it's a struggle for me to be like, are you saying I might be wrong about this?
[00:55:59] So I really feel like this past two weeks has been an interesting moment of this for me because I have been watching everything unfold and noticing within my body, like where do I feel fear? Where do I feel grief? What belief is that shaped by? Like. And trying to catch myself anytime I feel my empathy shrinking because of, you know, I'm like, What was I told to believe about these people? What was I told to believe about those people? What was I told to believe about, um, war versus terrorism? What was I told to believe about all these things?
[00:56:37] And what if I'm not right about any of it? What if I'm wrong about all of it? Like, what if I'm wrong about a portion of it? And really trying to sift through until I could feel like where I often will land, which is. I don't have to know. I don't have to become an expert at everything in the universe, but I do have to be willing to know who to trust and who to turn to.
[00:57:03] And for me, the most dependable place to turn to my whole life has been folks who are talking about freedom and justice and interdependence and being in a relationship with each other and with the earth. And so when I turn there, I can kind of relinquish some of my beliefs and like, okay, where can I sharpen?
[00:57:26] Um, and, or where can I grow? And asking my, the folks who are tuning in, listening in, watching and reading stuff that I write, like, you know, the same level of discernment that you can count on from me anywhere else. It's like, I'm going to do that here. And I'm going to uplift whatever I think is the right move, but there's something right right now at this moment in human history.
[00:57:54] If you are living in the West, if you are part of of the West, I think most of us are going to have to really let go of a lot of things we think of as core beliefs about good and bad and about like, what success looks like and about like, you know, What community it looks like, I think we're going to have to let go of a lot of what's been developed in us, which is individualization and living isolated individualistic and self interested existence, I think that this is a window. Of that, but I don't think it's a window that is sustainable in relationship to the climate crises that are unfolding and growing and in relationship to the global unrest that is both going to relate to the climate crisis and relate to tensions that are blowing out of control right?
[00:58:52] So I just think we're heading into a period that will be on par with world war with apocalyptic conditions at a global level. I think that humans can survive at this. My prayer is that humans can survive this, but we're going to have to be in different relationships to each other than we've ever been in.
[00:59:14] And even for me, that means letting go of some of the things I believe, right? Um, one of the core beliefs I've been working on lately is the idea of mine versus ours. And I'm like, Oh, I bought my house. It's mine. And I'm like, The land's not mine. The woods not mind the future of what happens in this location, I don't fully know what all is going to happen.
[00:59:38] There's so much about this that I don't need to hold on to in that way. But also it's exciting to be like, I'm developing a space that can be ours and shared. And whenever I travel, other people are here writing and using it as a writing retreat space. Like thinking of it that way. Yeah. Actually make different choices in the space.
[01:00:01] Mm-Hmm. relationship with that community around it.
[01:00:04] Deb: That makes, that's so interesting. And I, I think one of the things, like, there were a few things that were arising in me as you were talking. One was this sense of pressure of getting it right. And so I was like, Oh yeah, if this house isn't mine, then I have to do things that like that show people that I know it's not mine.
[01:00:30] And so there's this, I'm wondering if you feel at all the pressure to, because as a person who like, puts things out in the public. I mean, you seem very like immune to perfor, performativity, , but I'm watching people really like twist themselves into knots,
[01:00:52] adrienne maree brown: be accountable, you know? I would say to
[01:00:53] be kind of.
[01:00:54] Deb: I don't know if it's accountable, but to be perceived.
[01:00:59] adrienne maree brown: Yeah. I mean, I think that like, I think I'm recovering from being a fairly inauthentic person and friends, friends who I've known for since college or whatever, they know, like when they met me that I was, I was like 90 percent performance, you know, I didn't really know, I wasn't clear on who was. Who I was inside of myself.
[01:01:25] I think there's a lot of reasons for that. You know, a lot of it, I'm still the same girl. I'm still the same person. I'm a writer. I'm a singer. All those things. But I You know, I had a real question in my mind of who am I, and am I of value to people? And so there's a lot of trying to perform what I thought would be of value to people.
[01:01:50] I feel like I had a few breakdowns that shook that off of me, right? Where I was like, trying to live for other people, and I'm not going to survive that. I'm going to, I'm going to live and meet some other people's standards for myself, and I'm not going to survive that. And that's the feeling that comes up in me when I start moving towards the performative, and then there's this other thing that happens that is like, um a 10 ton weight in the gut, in the depth of my pelvic floor, that's just like, you've got to do this. This is the move. And a lot of times it's actually stuff that I don't really want to do. You know, I do feel that there's a way that I am obedient to, to truth that. Is like, I don't think about the performance anymore.
[01:02:40] Mm-Hmm. . Not that I never think about it. You know, there's times when I'm like, oh, I hope I, my singing voice sounds really pretty. Or there's stuff like that that's like, sure. Still present, right? Mm-Hmm. . But when it comes to, um, yeah, like when it comes to moments where it's like, um, the performative thing to do would be to stay neutral or to stay quiet, or to perform.
[01:03:05] Yeah, I'm just sort of like, it doesn't interest me as much as the risk of being authentic in the moment and see what happens there. I feel blessed because I'm in a community now. I'm in a extended community where I feel so affirmed for being exactly who and how I am. Right. So like, I have a whole group of people who are like, if you never posted anything on the internet ever again, we still love you. We still think you're hilarious.
[01:03:38] We still think you're fun to be around. We want to come to your game nights. We want to spend time with you. If you never wrote another book, I feel like you are of value and you have given enough to the world. I have that in my life now. It makes me, it just gives me this really deep root system for my life because I'm like, maybe I'll write another book. Right now I have tons of books in me and so I can, oh, I'm writing because I want to write and something is moving forward or I'm not writing because I feel like there's anything I need to keep up or prove to someone else or to win or whatever. It's just like,
[01:04:19] Deb: so how do you know those different feelings inside of you? Like I know how I feel them and right and that's something I'm cultivating that kind of inner awareness.
[01:04:32] So I'm wondering for you, if there's like a particular. Like process of discovery or just that kind of like, Oh, I can tell my belly is this and my pelvic floor is this.
[01:04:46] adrienne maree brown: Yeah. I mean, I do feel like I spent 10 years studying somatics and about half of that was teaching learning to be a teacher of somatics.
[01:04:57] And I know not everyone can do that exact path, but there is this organization called the embodiment Institute and they have a self guided embodiment course that you can do on your own time. It's like 5 sections and it really talks about how to drop in and start to really understand some of what's happening sensationally in your system and how to start to listen and discern, right. What's what's going on in me. So I feel like I spent a decade, um, going from really being about that performance, performative self and feeling unsatisfied, so untouched, so disconnected from the world, even though people were all around me and I had, you know, all this stuff.
[01:05:41] I feel like I spent a decade really dropping in to listening to the body. And I'm still learning. I mean, like part of the dance with disordered eating is. I've been really learning what enough feels like inside my body and recognizing that that's not like I've had a punitive sense of like, you're not allowed to have, I've had all these other, but I haven't really had not cultivated that sense of like, that's enough.
[01:06:06] That's good. You've had enough.
[01:06:07] Deb: So it can be so simple.
[01:06:10] adrienne maree brown: It can be simple, but it's also, I mean, I really do, like, I will feel something. So like when I first started hearing the news that was coming out, uh, from Israel and from Palestine, when I first started hearing it, all I felt was grief and it was a really intense, like it was like grief that had been backed up in my own system, grief that was an anticipatory grief because I was like, if this is happening.
[01:06:34] It's just going to get so bad from here, like everything is structured to go in the worst possible direction right now. I could feel all of that inside me and I wanted to just go crawl under a blanket, but that gut feeling was like, you have to write something right now that is a heart experience, that's what I want you to do. And even if you don't want to put it out, you have to put it out and you got to do it tonight.
[01:07:02] You got to do it today. You got to do it early in this process because people are going to be really scared to speak in an open hearted way in this moment. And you have to be someone who does that right. Now if I was, so this is where I'm like the body really keeps the score, but if you give it permission, the body can really guide you towards the things that are in most integrity because it's, it's, my heart is pounding a certain way.
[01:07:26] When my shoulders move a certain way, there's all these signs in my body that are like, this is a moment for you. And then you can fall back. There's moments that are not for you. You know, I'm always thinking about how do I. The universe has gifted me a certain level of light that shines on me and shines on the work that I do.
[01:07:48] Yeah. It's like, how do I not take that personally as if I'm something special, but how do I say this is my responsibility. This light this amount of light is my responsibility. So how do I shine it appropriately?
[01:08:01] Deb: Yeah. How do you parse that? I do want to get to kind of your meme game. Cause I also think that's like really hot and fun and intentional and like, yeah, but I wanted to say kind of like.
[01:08:13] What do you do with other people's opinions about what you're creating? Usually, I mean, both negative and positive. I don't only want to just be like, what do you do about haters? Cause sometimes what we do about the, the, the lover, the fans is sometimes also like.
[01:08:31] adrienne maree brown: Totally. I mean, the first couple of years when my visibility was growing, I felt a sense of like responsibility and looking for affirmation there.
[01:08:42] And then I had a couple of experiences where I could see, I felt really misunderstood online, or I felt like someone was targeting me or some, you know, something else was unfolding that felt like a really negative energy towards me. And I realized that it's the both/and, like you can't. Um, just pick the good stuff you really came in relationship to this thing.
[01:09:02] And the memes kind of started because I was like, I want to be able to still post and make things that really enjoy that I enjoy, but I don't feel like sharing my personal life as much as I was sharing it before. I don't want to have my lovers and my, my family and people on there because I'm like the haters will cast aspersions and put negative energy towards those relationships.
[01:09:26] And so the memes have become this way for me to, um, express myself that it still feels like a privacy. You know, it's like you're getting the emotion, but you don't get the story around the emotion. But I'm in here with you all feeling this emotion or, um, and then. And then, like, letting it ride. Like, I don't read comments a lot, and occasionally I'll dip in or I'll look at them, but for the most part, I'm really, like, I will post a meme thread and I'll be like, I love this.
[01:09:58] And then I'll just look at it several times, you know, throughout the day or I'm just like, this is so good. It makes me feel so happy how I love crafting them. And, you know, there's something about each one that is magically put together in a way that makes me happy. Yeah. So I think that, you know, that's been my mode is you, I also think, um, the more solid your offline relationships are, the more you can like, enjoy what you do online, if you're going to be there, I think it's really hard. If you're, if online becomes a primary space from what you're gathering relationship, then it becomes very precarious to take a risk with your audience.
[01:10:38] But like, you know, I call it social cachet because There's been moments in my life where I was like, I'm going to take a risk and speak up. I wrote a book about cancel culture when I read, you can't write that. You can't talk about this. You can't say this. And I was like, I'm okay. If I lose people over this, I'm okay because I do think that we need to make a space for not disposing of each other.
[01:11:00] So I'm going to make that space because my, my gut is telling me to speak up about it. And in this moment, I'm like, I know that I'm not an antisemetic person. I know that I am paying as much deep attention as I can. I know that I have a wide empathy for everything that's happening and I know I have an anti imperialist analysis and I think that I can risk whatever the social costs are of speaking from that place.
[01:11:25] And, um, and then, and you keep it moving also, it's just sort of like, yeah. I take social media breaks, you know, I, I recommend those to people to they, because as soon as you do, I don't know, you know, for a lot of people, it's like theoretical, but I'm like, if you really do take two weeks off every now and again, it can just remind you, like, there's a whole world of people who are just not on that space at all.
[01:11:49] And that's not where they're getting any of their sense of self from. And when I'm writing a book, I often will just get offline. I'll just come on like 10 minutes a day or something. And no, I do imagine a future where I'm not online. So this all feels like a great extravaganza.
[01:12:08] Deb: I love that. How would you recommend people like read your work or like, do you have any like best practices?
[01:12:17] Cause I want people to like dive in where it feels really good. I'm going to in my own voice, if it's okay, I'm going to read a bunch of quotes like that I pulled from like, adrienne maree brown quote page that are saying that are just like what I want people to know and feel. Yeah. So I'm so excited to do that.
[01:12:38] adrienne maree brown: I think a lot of people work with the quotes and there's like things you pull out. And then I always tell people start with Emergent Strategy. Okay. Great. Start with Emergent Strategy that's kind of the core foundational ground of the thinking. And then there's basically a fiction path and a nonfiction path that moved out from that place.
[01:12:58] So the fiction path, there's Octavia's Brood, which was actually published first, but it's really rooted in those ideas as well. Yeah. And then there's Grievers and Maroons and Fables and Spells, which is a storybook collection. Nonfiction side, there's Holding Change, which is about facilitation. There's Pleasure Activism. We Will Not Cancel Us. Um, I think that's. Those are the books. So yeah, I always have to keep looking because I'm like, and Radical Permission, which is a journal that people can use to go alongside of a course. And then building a bookshelf of other writers. So then you go to AK Press and look at the Emergent Strategy series, you can find them.
[01:13:38] Deb: Amazing. Thank you so much. Thank you for like coming, chatting and just being, and like, you know, kind of showing through your embodiment practices, which I know we probably just scratched the surface of, but I really appreciate just kind of like who you are in the world, what you create and how you lead us through how it's possible for ourselves to be in like different relationship with both ourselves and the world that we want to make. So thank you. Take care.
[01:14:16] Bye.